The invention concerns a seat with a seat support which has a seating surface as well as a backrest pivotably joined with it, which seating surface and backrest are movably and fixably held for rotatable and longitudinal movement in a seat support, whereby the back inclination of the backrest is adjustable with a fixed seating angle between the backrest and the seating surface through pivoting the seat support relative to the seat bracket, and whereby the seat inclination of the seating surface is adjustable about a pivot point of the seating surface that is fixed in a seat longitudinal direction on the seat bracket by pivoting the seat surface relative to the backrest.
Seats, in which the seating surface as well as the pivotably connected backrest which are movably and fixably held on a seat bracket for position adjustment are known, for example as office chairs or also as automobile seats in the most varied constructions.
Thus, for example in the back seat area, automobile seats with a so called drag support are used. With these previously known automobile seats, the seating surface can be moved forward using a motor servo drive. Since the seating surface is connected through a swivel joint with the back rest, the seating part pulls the back rest along which is slidably guided in a positively driven operation in the upper part of the rest.
The seat inclination of this previously known seat can be adjusted through a circular segment which can raise and depress the seating surface separately in a front free seat area of the seating surface by means of a further servo drive. Since in this previously known seat, the back inclination can only altered indirectly though a longitudinal motion of the seating surface, a comparatively longer adjusting motion is necessary for a greater change.
From DE 38 22 877 A1, a seat in accordance with the known Art, which is used as an airplane seat is provided. In order to alter the inclined position of the backrest in the seating area without encroaching upon the airplane passenger seated behind, the seat shell and backrest are at simultaneously slid in coulisse type glide guides. As the seat shell and the backrest are pivotably connected with each other, the seat position can be arrived at, in which the seating surface is maintained in its horizontal position and slides forward as the backrest is greatly inclined, without interfering with other passengers.
A further scat construction, in which the seat surface and its pivotably connected backrest are movably and fixably held, is known to the applicant from EP 0 865 960 A1. In this seat construction, which is used as an automobile seat, the backrest is moved through a crash induced force on the user of a seat from a given starting position into a safety position. For this, the carrier part has a support for the scat back arranged above the sitting surface and spaced with an effective lever arm from the position for the introduction of forces by the pelvis area against the seat back. The seat part is connected to a guide slanting upwardly and forwardly away from the seat back, so that during a frontal collision, the seat part is moved from the originally selected starting position into a position of greater safety.
From these known seats, the positionability between the seating surface and the backrest is set on the grounds of maintaining a limited area or for vehicle safety, where the seat and operator comfort of the user is not the primary focus of these seat constructions.
There therefore in particular exists the object of creating a seat of the above-mentioned type, which has a comparatively large adjustment range in order to provide the user with the greatest possible seat and operating comfort.
The accomplishment of this object in accordance of the invention is provided with a scat of the type mentioned at the beginning, in that for seat inclination positioning a drag link with an integrated drive arrangement is provided between the seating surface and the backrest.
In a further aspect of the invention, for seat inclination positioning, the backrest is connected to the seat bracket through a linear drive arrangement, that is constructed as a lifting drive and engages with its end region on the pivot point of the backrest in its restricted guide path.
In accordance with the inventive seat, a manual positioning of the seat inclination position is possible. Alternatively, a drive arrangement is provided, with which seat inclination position as well as seat position can be adjusted.
The adjustment of the seat and backrest inclination does not take place though the traditional direct adjustment of backrest and the seating surface, but rather the seating angle can be set by the proper adjustment the seating angle formed by the seating surface and the backrest by sliding the seating surface in the longitudinal direction of the seat and pivoting the seat support relative to the seat bracket to an individually desired extent. In comparison with, for example, previously known automobile seats, for example, with the seat of the invention, with an equal adjustment path, an essentially larger back inclination can be attained.
Here the seat of the invention can be constructed as an office chair or similar seating furniture or as an automobile seat, airplane seat or similar vehicle seat.
The seating surface and the backrest are in each case held rotatably and longitudinally slidable in restricted guides on the seat bracket. The seating surface and the backrest can for this be held through pivotable slide guides on the seat bracket. These pivotable slide guides permit in connection with a back inclination adjustment a simultaneous moving and rotation of the seating surface and the backrest. In connection with a seat inclination adjustment, the restricted guides allocated to the seating surface merely acts as a rotary joint, while the backrest, connected with the seating surface through a pivot joint, travels with its pivotable slide guide and can be rotated in relation to the seat bracket.
Consequently, the backrest can travel with its pivot point fixed in the longitudinal direction on the seat bracket as a consequence of a change in the seating angle along the positively driven operation allocated to the backrest, and in this way bring about a change in seat inclination. If in contrast, the seating angle formed between seating surface and backrest is fixed and the pivot point of the seating surface is moved in its positively driven operation, the backrest follows in its positively driven operation and inclines about its own pivot point in the positively driven operation of the backrest such that the entire seat support is pivoted relative to the seat bracket.
A preferred embodiment provides at least one drive arrangement for the backrest inclination positioning and the seat inclination positioniong.
The seat of the invention can be configured as an office chair or similar seating furniture without further ado. An embodiment in which the seat is constructed as an automobile seat or aircraft seat is preferred. A seat, constructed for example as an automobile seat, can be configured as a front or rear seat.